


The Difference

by sheafrotherdon



Series: Nantucket AU [37]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-11-10
Updated: 2007-11-10
Packaged: 2017-10-11 23:18:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/118264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheafrotherdon/pseuds/sheafrotherdon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The postcard's tucked between two bills, hemmed in by the rising price of electricity and one month's insurance for the Wagoneer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Difference

The postcard's tucked between two bills, hemmed in by the rising price of electricity and one month's insurance for the Wagoneer. It's such an insubstantial thing that John's inside the house before he really sees it, before the handwriting resolves into familiarity and the coffee stain speaks 'Rodney' so loudly that it stills his steps. For a long moment – pausing with the vague sense that comprehension's spinning some dizzying distance below him – he wonders why he chose to read the weekly grocery store flyer between the mailbox and the door, why floorboards are creaking beneath his feet as he reads this, why Rodney sent him a postcard, why Rodney sent a postcard to arrive today.

He stares at it for a while before he reads it, at the sharp angles of Rodney's script and the smudged ink of the postmark. Then he lets the words sink in, nervously at first, reading quickly to find the disaster that's no doubt looming at the end – and then he reads it again, slowly, his chest growing hot and tight with every ellipse, every sentence fragment, every stumbling effort on Rodney's part to say 'butIloveyou.'

 _butIloveyou. Rodney_.

Oh.

 _Oh_.

It's staggering, the force with which Rodney's words lodge themselves beneath his sternum, the difference between knowing and being told. In every way that counts it isn't news – that he's loved is summed up in every fight they have over the paper in a morning, in the way that Rodney fumbles self-consciously for his hand when they're walking Cash, in a fridge filled to bursting with more food than either of them can eat, in chilled aloe on summer days and mugs of tea when he's sick. But this, this sliver of cardboard, trusted to strangers, written with the muscle memory of sex still heavy on Rodney's body, this is . . .

He raises the postcard to his face, inhales the scent of ink and coffee and diesel fumes, and in the next moment, realizes Rodney's standing right there, panic and bravery warring on his face.

"You don't," Rodney says, and his voice is unsteady, "I just needed to, you don't have – "

" _Rodney_." John has to quiet him, has to make him listen, has to silence the tremor in Rodney's voice that speaks of so much feeling that John wants to fold in half, gasping at the clean, bright shock of it. He blows out a breath before he sucks in another, before he says in a rush, "Me too, and just, always, like this, okay?" He rubs his thumb over one eyebrow because he has to do something with his hands, has to press hard against the spot at his temple where relief and gratitude and impossibility crowd against his skin. He feels nauseated, like he might shake to pieces if he lets down his guard for one more second, yet god, god, he can't let this moment pass without Rodney _knowing_ , without him grasping that there are a hundred miserable instances of solitude lodged in the shadows between his bones and Rodney holds them at bay, fists his hands in John's shirt and strokes his fingers over a morning-bare hip, pushes back the possibility of drifting inconsequence, roots him in place with a bounty of affection that he never, ever believed he'd find. "You stayed, and I – I can't – " His voice is thick and he slides the postcard into his back pocket, tries to focus on the grain of the wood at his feet and the quality of light at his shoulder.

And then Rodney has him, pulls him close, broad shoulders and strong arms, and John can feel the tremors racing over Rodney's skin. His own cheeks burn hot and he hides his face in Rodney's neck, needs just a second to get acclimated, to adjust, but Rodney's hands are stroking over his spine, his lips pressing clumsily against his hair, and John lifts his face, his hands, presses Rodney back against the white-painted paneling at the bottom of the stairs, coats and coat-hooks and leashes be damned, kisses him, kisses him, paints his mouth with half-formed whispers and promises he hopes he has years to live inside.

"S'okay, s'okay," Rodney's murmuring back, but John can feel the way his fingers clench and release in the back of his shirt, _knows_ how rocked Rodney is by all of this, has the postcard to prove it.

"Can we – " He pulls back far enough to glance at Rodney's face, meets his gaze for the barest moment. "I need – "

"Me too, yeah, please, let's – " And Rodney's grasping his hand, pulling him upstairs, and something burns in John, soft and ragged, relentless, as Rodney fumbles with buttons, strips his body to match his thoughts, spreads him out over tumbled bedclothes neither of them tugged straight that morning, kisses him with fingers tangled in his hair, smelling of soap and coffee and Cash.

It could be their first time for the way their hands shake and their limbs move clumsily, the way they hesitate and watch each other and linger over touches that should be so routine. But this is new – a sharp, twisting, brilliant thing caught between bodies that are too old, John thinks, too old for this sort of revelation, but his skin sings to a different order, and with Rodney inside him, he closes his eyes so that none of this will spill out and burn them both.

"John," Rodney whispers, and the drag of his body refuses to let John slip away, the touch of his fingertips at John's cheek calls him back, and John looks at him, sees him, breath catching and hitching because what was trusted to a postcard is written on Rodney's face. And when he comes, eyes burning, body arcing helplessly into a familiar weight, Rodney's there to catch him, capable hands and wind-chapped lips cushioning his impact as he falls, falls, falls.


End file.
